U’s Head Coach Mark Bonner faced this media on Monday morning ahead of Cambridge United’s Sky Bet League One clash against Wigan Athletic…
On a run of fixtures against League One’s elite clubs:
“It is going to be a real challenge for us against teams that, let’s be honest, are expecting to win the league, let alone getting promoted. Obviously, different expectations to us but it is a nice challenge, and we know we can be competitive, we just have to turn competitive performances into points, scoring as much as we can.
“We are playing all the time at the minute; it is just game after game and that is quite enjoyable and quite exciting in some aspects, especially when you know you have got the games that we have got.
“It will be nice to have some home games, and I think when you look back to the week where we played Ipswich and Sheffield Wednesday in quick succession, we put in a couple of brilliant performances. I am hoping for the same this time round.”
On Wigan Athletic:
“They have got the ability to be aggressive and direct, playing forward passes into strikers like Charlie Wyke, and Stephen Humphreys that can physically dominate and be a real threat in the box off crosses.
“They have got players like James McLean, Callum Lang, as well as good quality full backs that want to attack and their possession stats are very high. They will also find ways to find Will Keane as a number 10, they have got lots of lots of options in attacking areas.
“Wigan are a team that can win in lots of different ways. So there is a variety to how they play. They are a team that we want to probably try to emulate as being somewhere in the future, not being one version or playing in every game, but being able vary our game to win games.”
On Wigan’s impressive away form:
“It is like us last year, when we were winning lots of games everyone said, “What do you put your home/away form down to?”, and it was just because we are a good team, and the best teams just win home or away, so their record comes as no surprise.
“Rotherham are unbeaten in 15 and have not lost a game since sometime in September, and that is the reality of the best teams, they have got the strength in depth to win games and churn out results as well as the ability to put a real consistency together – the same as we did last year.”
Team news:
“We are in no different of a position to what we were on Saturday, we will have the same players fit and available for us once more.
“Shilow [Tracey] has not trained for a couple of weeks now and he is still sore. We had him around the team on Saturday just to be there as a potential option. He is not quite ready to go yet, but we will see how he trains this morning.
“We do not want to risk throwing him in too soon and potentially worsening the injury he has.”